I’ve included tip on hosting a holiday cookie exchange after the recipe 🙂

Chocolate Cherry Cookies

Ingredients:

2 cups of unbleached flour
1 teaspoon of baking soda
1 teaspoon of salt
1 cup (2 sticks) of softened unsalted butter
3/4 cup of sugar
3/4 cup of brown sugar packed
1 teaspoon of vanilla
1 tablespoon of bourbon or whiskey
2 large eggs
1 1/2 cup of Milk Chocolate Chips
1 cup of Dried Cherries

Directions:

Preheat Oven to 375 degrees

In a medium bowl mix together flour, baking soda and salt. Add to mixer softened unsalted butter, sugar and packed brown sugar beating on a medium speed until creamy and smooth.

Using a small bowl beat eggs, vanilla and bourbon until well blended.

Turn mixer on low add 1/2 the flour mixer and 1/2 egg mixer to the sugar cream. Beat until completely combined then add the rest of the flour and egg mixture to the batter lightly mixing for 1 to 2 minutes.

Be careful to not over mix as cookies will not be light and fluffy.

Using a spatula fold in the chocolate chips and cherries to the batter. At this point batter will be a little sticky, so use a tablespoon to scoop and drop cookies onto a lightly greased cookie pan spacing 2 inches apart. Bake for 9-11 minutes or until cookies are lightly golden brown.

Remove chocolate cherry cookies from oven and allow to cool for approximately 3 minutes and then remove from pan and place on a cooling rack to finish cooling.

One of my favorite thing to use when baking is coconut cooking spray.  It makes baking easy and you can lightly grease your baking pans without having a chemical taste you might get from some of the other cooking sprays.

Quick Variation on Chocolate Cherry Cookies

Drop the cookie dough into a lightly greased 9×13 cake pan and spread the batter evenly around the pan.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and bake for 20 – 25 minutes or until a butter knife comes out clean when poked into the batter.

Remove from oven and cool for 5 -7 minutes then cut into 2 inch square bars.

Remove from pan and finish cooling on a cooling rack.

HOW TO HOST A HOLIDAY COOKIE EXCHANGE 

Pin Chocolate Cherry Cookies Recipe to Pinterest

Little did I know when house sitting in Pelopennese, Greece,  I would get involved in baking Christmas cookies!

I have been told ever so often that the Greeks were the first to use olive oil for Christmas baking! I say these delicious cookies are in a league of their own!

Greek Christmas sweets are plentiful with the ingredients symbolic of prosperity and hope for the coming year: walnuts, almonds, and dried fruits communicate wishes for the coming year, while white powdered sugar is the hope-conveying cover on numerous holiday cookies.

Honey is drizzled over mountains of dough fritters – made in olive oil, of course!

Apparently Neapoli, Pelopennese, was the birthplace of this classic Christmas cookie.

Greek Christmas Cookies Recipe

Ingredients:

For the syrup:
1 cup sugar
1 cup honey
1⁄2 / 120ml water
1 medium cinnamon stick
1 inch strip lemon zest

For the cookies:
3-31⁄2 cups all-purpose flour, as needed
1 scant teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1⁄2 teaspoon ground cloves
1 cup / 240 ml extra virgin Greek olive oil
1⁄2 cup sugar
1⁄2 teaspoon baking sod
1⁄2 teaspoon baking soda
1⁄2 cup / 120 ml fresh orange or lemon juice
1⁄4 cup / 60 ml brandy
1 cup chopped walnuts
Grated zest of 1 orange

Directions:

Preheat Oven to 325 F.

SYRUP:
Bring the sugar, honey and water to a boil in a medium-size saucepan.
Add the cinnamon and lemon zest and simmer over medium heat for 10 minutes.
Let cool completely.

COOKIES:
Sift together 3 cups of the flour, the baking powder, cinnamon, and cloves in a small bowl and set aside.

In a large bowl, beat the olive oil with the sugar until creamy. Stir the baking soda into the citrus juice and add to the oil-and-sugar mixture. Add the brandy, walnuts and grated zest, and continue mixing vigorously until combined.

Slowly add the flour to the mixture, beating vigorously with a wooden spoon until a stiff dough forms.

Lightly oil 2 large baking sheets.

One at a time, break off pieces of dough the size of an unshelled walnut and shape into small, oblong mounds. Place 1 inch apart on the baking sheets and bake until lightly browned, about 20 minutes.

Remove from the oven and submerge in the cooled syrup to soak for a few minutes. Drain on racks.

Optional: Sprinkle with walnuts

More Cookies To Try This Holiday:

18 Cookie Exchange Recipes Your Friends Will Love

Easy Christmas Cookie Recipes With Few Ingredients

5-Ingredient Chewy Coconut Macaroons Recipe

Snickerdoodle Snickers Cookies Recipe

Quick and Easy Sour Cream Cookies Recipe

Pin Greek Christmas Cookies To Pinterest

I enjoy the Triple Chocolate biscotti with my coffee in the morning but the biscotti I was finding in the store were always so rock hard. I mean, I get that its supposed to be hard, but I don’t want it to be rock hard, know what I mean?

It does not take that long to make and it tastes so much better, in my opinion.

Triple Chocolate Biscotti Recipe

Gather up your supplies for this simple and delicious chocolate biscotti recipe.  You likely already have all of these ingredients on hand, and that means you can whip this up at nearly any time. Be sure to print the easy to use recipe below and keep on hand for last minute baking!

Triple Chocolate Biscotti Ingredients

2 cups of unbleached flour
1 1/2 teaspoons of baking powder
1/4 teaspoon of salt
3/4 cup of sugar
1 stick of unsalted butter, softened
1 teaspoon of vanilla
2 large eggs
1 – 10oz package of Nestle Triple Chip Morsels

Triple Chocolate Biscotti Directions

In a medium bowl mix together dry ingredients (flour, baking powder and salt).

In mixer add butter and sugar and cream together until smooth. Add vanilla to the butter mixture before adding each egg one at a time.

Once eggs are completely mixed into the butter mixture slowly add 1/2 of the flour mixture to bowl and once it is completely mixed remove from mixer stand and fold in the rest of the flour and chip morsels.

Be careful to not over mix the batter as the biscotti will be dry and tough.

After chips and flour are mixed in divide batter in half and place onto 2 greased or sprayed cookies sheets.

Then form each half of the batter into 2 12inch by 3inch by 1 1/4 inch logs and bake for approximately 30-40 minutes or until lightly golden brown and a knife stuck into the center of the log comes our clean.

Be sure not to over bake as you will cut and bake them again. Allow the biscotti to cool for 30 minutes and then move to a wooden cutting board that is larger than your biscotti log.

Once it has been transferred to cutting board use a serrated knife to cut log into 1/2 slices.

After sliced you should have approximately 24 pieces of biscotti.

Take each of the pieces and arrange them cut side down on a baking sheet and return to over for another 15minutes or until biscotti is a golden brown.

Remove from over and transfer to a cooling rack to cool and harden. Very important wait until biscotti has cooled completely before storing in an airtight container as biscotti will soften.

Triple Chocolate Biscotti Chocolate Drizzle

4oz package Nestle Triple Chocolate Morsels

I like to use Nestle Milk Chocolate Morsels for this part as it seems to work the best.  While your Triple Chocolate Biscotti is cooling melt your chocolate.  There are three ways that your can choose to do this either by microwave, double boiler, or direct heat.  Each of them have their pros and cons for melting chocolate, but if your careful any of them can do the trick.

Microwave: Using a microwave safe bowl place 4oz of chocolate and melt uncovered on high for 1-2 minutes stirring every 30 seconds until chocolate is melted and smooth.

Double Boiler: Take a saucepan and fill with about an inch of water, then using a glass bowl that is larger than the saucepan so that the bottom does not touch the water.  Place chocolate in the bowl and bring the water to a low boil and melt chocolate.  Once chocolate is melted and smooth drizzle over biscotti

Direct Heat: This is one of the easiest methods of melting chocolate but is also the fastest ways to burn the chocolate.  Place a saucepan on a low heat and add chocolate and slowly melt over heat.  However, be very careful when using this method as you can easily burn the chocolate.

Hint:

One of my favorite cutting board to use while making biscotti is a Boos Block cutting board.  This is a great board to have in your kitchen as they are made of high-quality wood and are very durable.  Also cleaning this boards is very easy as it takes just a little bit of water.

Make this triple chocolate biscotti recipe for breakfast treats, afternoon snacks, or to gift to your coffee loving friends.  With such a delicious chocolate flavor, it is one that everyone will love!

More Cookie Recipes:

• Anise Biscotti Recipe
• Pecan Biscotti Recipe
• Vegan No Bake Peanut Butter Cookies
• Cashew Chocolate Chip Cookies Recipe

Pin Chocolate Biscotti Recipe

Mantacados were first mentioned by Juan de la Mata, 1747. Today ‘Sierra Casa Salinas’ in Tudela (Pamplona) is the oldest known Mantacados bakery run for 6 generations by the Salinas Casado family.

These traditional Spanish crumble cakes or “mantecados” crumble very easily. In fact, they are so soft, they will literally melt in your mouth. Light and with a delicate anise flavor, words will not do them justice.

You’ll have to make them to see why they are a Spanish favorite and why no Spanish home is without “mantecados” at Christmas!

Mantecados Recipe – Traditional Spanish Crumble Cakes Ingredients

2 1/4 cups vegetable shortening
1 cup vegetable oil
1 2/3 cup granulated sugar
4 egg yolks
2 shot glasses of anise (see note below for substitute)
1 lemon peel, grated
juice from 1 lemon
1/2 tsp cinnamon
7 1/4 cups unbleached white flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 egg white, beaten for glaze

Substitution Note: Anise-flavored liqueur can be purchased at most liquor stores and some gourmet supermarkets. If you cannot find it in your area, substitute 2 shot glasses of vodka and 1 1/2 tsp of anise extract.

Mantecados Recipe – Traditional Spanish Crumble Cakes Directions

In a very large mixing bowl, use a hand mixer to whip the vegetable shortening with the oil. Add the sugar and mix until smooth. Add the egg yolks, anise, lemon peel, juice and cinnamon and mix together.

Add flour and baking soda to mixture, a cup at a time. Be sure to mix well. Dough should be very smooth and soft.

Preheat oven to 325 degrees.

Using a teaspoon, scoop out a dollop of dough. Form balls about the size of walnuts, using your hands. If dough is too sticky to roll into balls, mix in additional flour (from 1/4 to 1/2 cup). Place balls onto ungreased cookie sheet.

Lightly press down on each ball to flatten slightly.

Using the beaten egg white, brush on the top of each cookie.

Bake cookies until they begin to turn light brown on the bottom edges – about 15-20 minutes.

Let the cookies cool 5 minutes before removing from the cookie sheet, as they are very delicate.
For variation top with icing sugar, sprinkle nuts on or glaze with food coloring.

***Pin Spanish Crumble Cakes Recipe To Pinterest***

More Cake Recipes:

How To Make Easy Maple Bacon Cupcakes

Apple Cheesecake

Twist On A Red Velvet Layer Cake Recipe

Salted Margarita Cupcakes Recipe

Please welcome Paula from the soon to be published site Love & Gingerbread to the blog. Love & Gingerbread is set to go live on Oct 15. It is all about European Christmas’ and I can’t wait. I convinced Paula to share a few sneak peaks from her site with us. She shared an European Brown Gingerbread and now she brings us a recipe for Chestnut Tortelli Cookies, also known as Baby Jesus’ Pillows.

Now, over to Paula.

Having met Deb I learned about her yearning for Italy. Living in Munich means Italy is never far, means as well there will be plenty of pictures from Italy, Italian Christmas Markets and well, no Italian Christmas would be complete without one or more traditional desserts!

I love chestnuts. I love picking them and I love Italian chestnut fairs. Find yourself in Italy in Autumn and make sure you visit one. The chestnut fairs (sagre) offer everything from caldarroste (roasted chestnut kiosks), to castagnaccio (cake made from chestnuts, pine nuts and raisins), chestnut flour, chestnut marmalade, Christmas chestnut tortelli and even ravioli pasta.

Autumn in Italy is an enchanting promise and opens the pre-Christmas season.

Chestnut Tortelli Cookies Recipe

INGREDIENTS:

3-1/2 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
8 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into chunks
2 eggs, room temperature
1/4 cup olive oil
2 tablespoons cold water
10 ounces peeled, cooked fresh or canned chestnuts
2/3 cup sugar
1 tablespoon unsweetened cocoa powder
3 tablespoons rum or brandy
1-1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
3/4 cup chopped semisweet chocolate or mini chocolate chips
Confectioner’s sugar for coating

DIRECTIONS:

• Combine the flour, baking powder, and salt in a food processor.
• Add the butter and pulse the mixture until coarse crumbs form.
• In a small bowl, whisk together the eggs, oil, and water.
• Add to the flour mixture and pulse until a dough starts to form.
• Remove the dough, shape into a disk, and wrap in plastic wrap.
• Let rest for 30 minutes. The dough can also be refrigerated for up to 48 hours.
• Combine the chestnuts, sugar, cocoa, and rum, and cinnamon in a food processor.
• Process until finely chopped and transfer to a bowl. Stir in the chocolate.
• Preheat the oven to 375-degrees F.
• Line 2 large baking sheets with parchment paper.
• Divide the dough into 4 pieces.
• Roll out each piece about 1/8-inch thick.
• With a biscuit cutter, cut out 2-1/2 inch rounds.
• Place a teaspoon of the filling on one half of each round.
• Moisten the edge of the round with a little water, fold the round in half and pinch the edges to seal.
• Place the tortelli on the baking sheets.
• Bake 15 minutes or until lightly browned and crisp.
• As the tortelli come out of the oven, transfer them to a bowl filled with the confectioner’s sugar.
• Roll them in the sugar and then transfer to wire racks.